Donald Trump closes in on US election victory

Pollsters and political experts reckon most of the states are sewn up for one candidate or the other, with only seven truly competitive battlegrounds. These are the so-called Rust Belt states, the former industrial heartlands of Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania; and the Sun Belt states of Georgia, North Carolina, Nevada and Arizona in the southern and western parts of the country.

Trump has so far won Pennsylvania, Georgia and North Carolina and is ahead in other races.

Voters across the country say their top priority this time was “democracy,” according to exit polling reported by NBC News, followed by the economy, abortion and migration. Trump is making inroads winning support from black and Latino men, in two crucial swing states — North Carolina and Georgia, surveys suggested.

The weeks and days leading up to the election have been tense. The campaign split the country, with many voters feeling they have a terrible choice to make between the outlandish and unpredictable Trump — or Harris, who has struggled to define herself or set out what she would do differently to President Joe Biden if she wins. 

Name-calling and violence

The two sides have traded insults, with Harris branding Trump a fascist, while he has called her a “sleazebag.” The specter of violence has haunted the political atmosphere, too. Trump was targeted twice by would-be assassins, once escaping by the narrowest of margins as a bullet cut his ear. He has also indulged in his own violent rhetoric in recent days, suggesting Harris should fight Mike Tyson and one of her supporters should be shot at. 

Before the results came out, Trump and his team had been stoking the narrative that the contest was unfair or corrupted, without providing evidence that satisfied authorities. A judge in Georgia threw out Republican complaints over the process Tuesday.